Warrior's Mercy

Out of the flaming furnace of a crashed B-25 at a China base came the agonized screams of a dying, 20-year-old sergeant-gunner. Sickened airmen stood around the plane and listened, sobbing in helpless horror. They had tried rescue. As many as six had rushed in, had hauled and tugged, even tried to pull the sergeant loose from his legs, crushed and trapped behind the copilot's seat. They had failed, driven back by the consuming fire.

Suddenly a 31-year-old lieutenant colonel, veteran of 80 missions and ranking officer at the base, walked forward, lifted his heavy pistol and fired two shots. The screaming stopped.

Last week the Army, keeping all names secret, told the tragic story and its aftermath. A general court-martial of seven colonels had tried the officer on a charge of voluntary manslaughter. He had chosen not to testify for himself. His counsel had argued that he acted irrationally under great emotional strain, that medical testimony left a reasonable doubt whether the sergeant died from bullets or from burning.

Of the nature of mercy in military ethics, not a word was said.

For a half hour the court debated, then announced its verdict: since two-thirds had failed to vote for conviction, the officer stood acquitted.

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